Is this contract a bargain for the Chicago Bears?

When the Chicago Bears traded for D.J. Moore they did not just add a player, but they also picked up his contract. Moore signed a 3-year extension worth over $61M with the Carolina Panthers back in 2022. So, while the Bears will be debating the contract extensions of Chase Claypool, and Darnell Mooney, they have to be factoring in the salary of Moore, and how much they can seriously commit to one room.

The Chicago Bears got a bargain contract with D.J. Moore

However, the good news for the Bears is that they are going to have room to wiggle. First, the Panthers spent $9M in cap space from old money before the trade, so the Bears are only taking on $52M over the next three seasons. Even better is that they are on the books for $20.1M this season, which really limits how big his deal gets over the next two years. This is easy for the Chicago Bears to manage because of how much cap space they have. They are eating the biggest chunk of Moore's deal and they still have over $30M in cap space to work with.

What happens in the next two seasons after that is D.J. Moore becomes a value. He is on the cap for $16.05M in each of the next two seasons. To put that into perspective, this year he is taking up 8.7% of the cap space. Next year, his salary would only be 6.3% and in 2025 it should only be 5.7%. It continues to become a better deal for Chicago.

Currently, Moore is slated at the 10th highest salary for wide receivers. Over the next two seasons, he will drop closer to 19th. That is going from around names such as Terry McLaurin and Deebo Samuel to names like Hunter Renfrow and Odell Beckham.

Beyond that, you have to factor in that there will now be more contract extensions coming down the pipeline for big-name wide receivers. Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb, Brandon Aiyuk, and Tee Higgins are just a few of the names to certainly get a deal bigger than Moore.

So, the Chicago Bears will be paying Moore money like he is outside the top 20 in both 2024 and 2025. However, at his age, and his progression within the offense, they may be getting the top 10 type of player that he will be getting paid like this season.

The deal was obviously a win for the Bears when you factor in everything they got. However, a small detail such as Moore's contract being so team-friendly is just another added detail that is easy to get excited about.